Gas prices in Europe closed trading with an increase of 11 percent

MOSCOW, September 5 – PRIME. Exchange prices for gas in Europe closed trading on Monday with an increase of 11% and stopped slightly above $2,460 per thousand cubic meters, according to data from the London ICE exchange.

The nearest – October – futures (according to the index of the largest European hub TTF) opened trading at $2,810.5 per thousand cubic meters (+26.6%). The growth rate reached a maximum of 31.4%, prices reached $2917.4. However, then the quotes began to gradually weaken and in the late afternoon reached a price low of $2,463.2 (+11%). Recent futures traded almost at a low of $2,464 (+11%). The dynamics of quotations is given from the settlement price of the previous day – 2219.6 dollars per thousand cubic meters.

Gazprom on Friday reported that the Nord Stream gas pipeline, which was previously stopped for three days for scheduled maintenance, could not resume operation due to an oil leak at the only running Trent 60 unit. A representative of the German Siemens Energy told RIA Novosti that the company does not consider Gazprom’s conclusion a technical reason for shutting down the gas pipeline.

The downtime of Nord Stream deprives Europe of up to 33 million cubic meters of gas per day, or about 1 billion cubic meters per month. Such losses are superimposed on the previous reduction in supplies from Russia via Nord Stream and other routes by at least 8-9 billion cubic meters per month.

Nord Stream has been operating with restrictions since mid-June, and since the end of July, it has been operating at only 20% of its nearly 170 million cubic meters of capacity per day. The Russian side emphasized that the decline in supplies was due solely to international sanctions, which caused problems with the maintenance and repair of Siemens gas pumping units. Recently, only one turbine provided work.

In early March, gas prices in Europe, due to fears of a ban on the import of Russian energy resources, updated their historical highs for four days in a row. The price record of $3,892 per thousand cubic meters was reached on March 7. The last significant increase was in the second half of August. On the news of the three-day suspension of Nord Stream for maintenance, quotes reached $3,500 per thousand cubic meters.